Florida leads in gains by low-income kids

Florida’s low-income students made impressive gains from 2003 to 2009 on NAEP reading and math tests for fourth and eighth grade, writes Matthew Ladner on Jay Greene’s blog. In fact, Florida also made large gains from 1998 to 2002, Ladner writes, but there isn’t data for all 50 states going back that far. (FRL stands for free and reduced lunch eligibility, the standard measure of student poverty.)

Low-income students lost ground in West Virginia, which is a leader in teaching “21st-century skills.” Coincidence?